The Power Crisis

[Whynot]

ONE POINT TWENTY ONE GIGAWATTS!

ONE POINT TWENTY ONE GIGAWATTS!

I'll get me coat.

Dave

Thats it !!!
we need lightning, a flux capacitor and a delorean ..... that will fix all of our power problems

[firefighter]

funny how they wait until they think there's a possibility of a crisis before they say anything...............or try to do something about it, hell there's been the whole summer, and hell i'll point fingers at the gummint, over-all we expect them to ensure the wellbeing of us all and the supply of power and water etc?(pretty much a necessity i'd say these days!)

[Swampdonkey]

Dear leader should of had new generation plants on the go ,9 years to do fuck all.......

[Nagash]

For people saying go nuclear, NZ couldn't actually go nuclear if they wanted to.. it's been widely reported that even the smallest nuclear power station would produce epic amounts more power then NZ would even know what to do with. Therefore, do as Steam suggested and turn on more shite and we may actually be able to go nuclear!

This constant struggle with the power demands has been going on for a couple of decades now.. nothing new. Auckland will do a whole load of bugger all (bless us) and they'll bitch the most. The Southerner's will go weeks without power and not make a single noise. Then it'll all just be forgotten about and eveything will go back to how it was.

Always has, always will..

[Dave Lobster]

For people saying go nuclear, NZ couldn't actually go nuclear if they wanted to.. it's been widely reported that even the smallest nuclear power station would produce epic amounts more power then NZ would even know what to do with.

So... what does a nuclear submarine do with all its excess power?

[jrandom]

Power cuts are fun.

The last time I was affected by one was during the Great Corroded Shackle Debacle of 2006. I got the day off work.

I don't recall being affected by one between then and the time I was taking a leak in the bathroom on the 15th floor of the Auckland Club Tower in February 1998 and all the lights went out.



I got most of the month off work, that time.

If Joe Average Small Customer could tie utility companies down to service-level contracts with strict financial penalties surrounding breaches (I suspect that the large single industrial customers already do, but that doesn't help anybody else; in fact, it probably fucks things up when they get priority) we'd have a bulletproof electricity grid infrastructure in no time flat.

As things stand, why should any of the generation and retailing companies invest further in infrastructure? They can sit back, slurp creamy cash off their customers, and when their capacity overloads, shrug and flick the 'off' switch - it ain't them feeling the pain.

Perhaps that situation is what Gubmint needs to remedy. Make the utility-company motherfuckers accountable. Make them bleed.

[jrandom]

So... what does a nuclear submarine do with all its excess power?

Nuclear reactors create heat, which is used to drive steam turbines. Unlike power plants which drive steam turbines off heat created by burning coal, oil or gas, nuclear reactors can't be easily turned up or down, on or off. They're best just fired up and left to happily fission their way through their fuel, uninterrupted, with any unwanted heat energy thrown away.

One design issue for nuclear reactors is ensuring a sufficient supply of water to both drive the steam turbines and carry away waste heat from the reactor.

It is fairly obvious to the casual observer that this isn't a difficult problem to solve when designing a reactor to power a submarine.

[ynot slow]

Tiwai Pt smelter takes something like 15% of national power?I think was stated on the news.Also when minister David Parker states no power outages this winter,who do you believe?

The last major cutbacks in 94? was good for us at work,we went from 7pm closing on Friday night to 6pm to save power,never looked back.With the cutbacks the H/W cylinder wouldn't heat enough,change the thermostat and element to 3kw(was 1kw)and turn it up,so when power off the cylinder had a reasonable temp to it,did this towards the end of the cutbacks but worked well.Also Tues & Thurs were soccer practice and we had gas heating so a good shower was enjoyed with heaps of hot water,then come Saturday by the time we got into showers after the curtain raisers most of water was luke warm,worst part was we played 7 games away with clubs with electric H/Wcylinders,only 2 were homegames with gas,then normal service resumed.

Who cares what fires the stations,heat is needed in winter,stuff the greens,let them freeze if they wish too.Had a couple of outages last month on Fridays around 5pm,only for an hour or so but bloody anoying,feel for the southeners when it is off for days and snowing.

[kevfromcoro]

So... what does a nuclear submarine do with all its excess power?

Thats a point.....
Mayebe we could hook a couple of them mothers into the national grid.

[McDuck]

Power cuts are fun.

The last time I was affected by one was during the Great Corroded Shackle Debacle of 2006. I got the day off work.

I don't recall being affected by one between then and the time I was taking a leak in the bathroom on the 15th floor of the Auckland Club Tower in February 1998 and all the lights went out.



I got most of the month off work, that time.

If Joe Average Small Customer could tie utility companies down to service-level contracts with strict financial penalties surrounding breaches (I suspect that the large single industrial customers already do, but that doesn't help anybody else; in fact, it probably fucks things up when they get priority) we'd have a bulletproof electricity grid infrastructure in no time flat.

As things stand, why should any of the generation and retailing companies invest further in infrastructure? They can sit back, slurp creamy cash off their customers, and when their capacity overloads, shrug and flick the 'off' switch - it ain't them feeling the pain.

Perhaps that situation is what Gubmint needs to remedy. Make the utility-company motherfuckers accountable. Make them bleed.

What happens when a piss head takes out a power pole? We need more hydro, and we need to better use the ones we have.

[megageoff76]

Thats it !!!
we need lightning, a flux capacitor and a delorean ..... that will fix all of our power problems

Screw that, every home needs to install a Mr Fusion.

[puddytat]

I'd tell RioTinto to go take a hike for the winter & turn off the smelter....we could also pay them a few mill compo for lost production & put the workers on a benefit so they could go on holiday for the winter....still a 'Dam' site cheaper than a nuclear option or coal or water for that matter

[devnull]

For people saying go nuclear, NZ couldn't actually go nuclear if they wanted to.. it's been widely reported that even the smallest nuclear power station would produce epic amounts more power then NZ would even know what to do with. Therefore, do as Steam suggested and turn on more shite and we may actually be able to go nuclear!

This constant struggle with the power demands has been going on for a couple of decades now.. nothing new. Auckland will do a whole load of bugger all (bless us) and they'll bitch the most. The Southerner's will go weeks without power and not make a single noise. Then it'll all just be forgotten about and eveything will go back to how it was.

Always has, always will..

Dunno where you got that info from, but it's wrong.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf77.html

or even better:

http://www.nextenergynews.com/news1/...ar-12.17b.html

[Robert Taylor]

Shoot the greenies and bring on nuclear power. Its not the most future proof idea, but I hate tree huggers.

We are all ''green'' at heart but there are those who are also realistic. 9 years in power and nothing has been done to address the power issue. Another nail in Labours coffin.

[McDuck]

I'd tell RioTinto to go take a hike for the winter & turn off the smelter....we could also pay them a few mill compo for lost production & put the workers on a benefit so they could go on holiday for the winter....still a 'Dam' site cheaper than a nuclear option or coal or water for that matter

You do know one of the things they make is the metal for the control flaps for the airbus A380s? Why should we penilise there buisnes becasue some pen pusher cant to his job properly?